MugzyBrown:I just don't agree with the idea that some guys signed a contract 250 years ago and everybody who happens to be born within imaginary lines are forever bound by that contract.

That's the thing. You can leave. You are not forced to stay within those imaginary lines. I have yet to see a sovereign citizen case that is about actual rights or individual independence. All of them are about avoiding responsibility. If you don't want the responsibility of obeying traffic laws, don't drive. If you don't want the responsibility of paying property taxes, don't own a home. You aren't forced to do these things by that contract signed 250 years ago. These sovereign citizens aren't advocating revolution or the toppling of a corrupt government. They're advocating gaming the system, the same system that gives them the right to try and game it. If their arguments were based more on solid principles and less on semantics, they might gain more respect.

Discordulator:So, to anyone wanting to declare sovereignty. From the moment of declaration, you should hereby forfeit any and all claim to contract or legal redress as a member of the nation you are declaring sovereignty from.

As of that moment you are trespassing on foreign soil, and should be subject to the same laws as undocumented immigrants. We will extradite you to any nation that will acknowledge your citizenship, of your choosing, and bill you for the costs (including infrastructure costs, like roads) that your trespass has incurred.

Failure of any nation's soil being willing to accept you will result in a lifelong garnishment of wages to cover the cost you incur to the people whose land you are a foreign visitor to.

No, see, the really funny part is that these yahoos claim that they still enjoy all protections of the Constitution up through the 13th Amendment. Part of their mystic legal incantations is that the 14th Amendment created some distinction between "State Citizens" and "US Citizens" such that you can choose to be one without being the other. So, all Constitutional rights and protections before that point count for the "original" "State Citizens" portion and, provided you maintain that you are a citizen of your state but not a US citizen, you still get all those sweet, sweet protections.

Of course, they also believe that each State Citizen Who Is Not A US Citizen is legally owns a secret bank account of gold (I swear I am not making this up) and that any debts they owe to a "legitimate" government authority can simply be drafted against this bank account. So, take their status as being rational human beings with a grain of salt roughly the size of Iowa.

>>The officer said the driver "challenged me with different codes and stuff at first."

Oh no, the driver probably has an obnoxious level of case law memorized for just this event. Well guess what, it's an officer's job to know the laws too.

>>A tape was shown of the incident, though Kiesche claimed it had been altered and that parts were missing. The officer said initially a camera was not working. He said under the new video setup that officers have no way to alter video.

Okay, now this is BS. The camera "wasn't working properly" and parts of the stop were missing? Judge should throw out the case based on this alone.

Unless he's claiming police brutality the camera not working is not a big deal. You don't need video tape to prove no liscence and lack of insurance

geekbikerskum:sprgrss: Which is incredibly stupid because you would never fly a fringed flag on a ship because the fringe would be ripped off in a heartbeat.

Does anyone know what the gold fringe actually *means* and why it's there? Is there a historical context for it? Did it have some meaning in the past that's now vestigial? Unfortunately trying to search for this stuff on Google turns up nothing but pages with so much derp about Freemasons, sovereign citizens, and the non-validity of the Sixteenth Amendment that it makes my eyes bleed and my brain hurt.

Farce-Side:MugzyBrown: I just don't agree with the idea that some guys signed a contract 250 years ago and everybody who happens to be born within imaginary lines are forever bound by that contract.

That's the thing. You can leave. You are not forced to stay within those imaginary lines.

Exactly. When you turn 18 you are legally able to attempt to emigrate. If you decide to stay, you are consenting to the laws of the country. If you then also get a job with a taxable income, you are consenting to pay taxes on that income.

MugzyBrown:Farce-Side: So what's the real basis behind this sovereign citizen crap? Nobody's ever been able to really explain it to me.

We are all born into a contract of rules we never have a chance to review and agree to.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them,

If the US Colonies could do it with the British, why can't NJ do it with the US, or Newark with NJ, or the whatever neighborhood with Newark, etc

So, I'm going to assume you are either connected to or are somewhat sympathetic to the sovereign citizen movement (correct me if I'm wrong). Basically, what you're saying is, sovereign citizens believe they were born into a set of circumstances which they find disagreeable, and therefore are not obligated by any authority to obey the laws of the land.

CSB, the same thing happened to me when Verizon took over alot of Alltell's wireless network here. I was told by a guy working at the Verizon store that because I hadn't signed a contract with Verizon, I could cancel the service and not be forced to pay the cancellation fee. Long story short, it was cheaper to pay the cancellation fee than to hire a lawyer and go to court over the cancellation fee, so I still had to pay it, even though I didn't have a contract with Verizon. End CSB.

I'm not going to mock these people trying to get out of fines and taxes, because hey, who doesn't want to not give away their money, but I would argue that if you use the roads paid for by a government entity, if you use the currency manufactured by a governemnt entity, if you take advantage of any other services provided by a government entity, then you have indeed knowingly entered into a contract with said government to observe any and all laws regulating the use of said services. Don't like the rules? Get out of Dodge. Nobody is forcing you to remain a US citizen. There are several other countries to choose from.

I'll agree that sometimes it's necessary for a people to dissolve the ties to their governement. I will not agree that that time is whenever you get a parking ticket you don't like, or when you have to pay the same taxes everyone else does.

>>The officer said the driver "challenged me with different codes and stuff at first."

Oh no, the driver probably has an obnoxious level of case law memorized for just this event. Well guess what, it's an officer's job to know the laws too.

>>A tape was shown of the incident, though Kiesche claimed it had been altered and that parts were missing. The officer said initially a camera was not working. He said under the new video setup that officers have no way to alter video.

Okay, now this is BS. The camera "wasn't working properly" and parts of the stop were missing? Judge should throw out the case based on this alone.

Unless he's claiming police brutality the camera not working is not a big deal. You don't need video tape to prove no liscence and lack of insurance

This.

He was lucky that he wasn't charged with failure to stop for the police. He probably got off on that charge because of the camera malfunction.

Farce-Side:banandar123: tlchwi02: i got hit with a 75 dollar book in the neck once, and you bet it hurt. tiny little asian girl turned out had a heck of an arm on her

May I ask why a tiny asian girl threw a book at you?

It's not that weird, that's the same kind of kink I'm into as well.

So what's the real basis behind this sovereign citizen crap? Nobody's ever been able to really explain it to me.

There is no legal basis, that's why it's so much fun to mock them. These people are either nutty enough to actually believe this crap, or they just figure that if they make big, legal-ey sounding noises, the big bad gubmint will run away in terror. JohnAnnArbor referred to it as cargo-cult law upthread, and I'd say that's about right: They know that certain things can have a legal effect, but they have no clue why they work, or what, exactly, the effect is. As a result, they come up with all manner of insane shiat and run with it. One sovereign citizen tells another one about their crackpot theory and gets another one from them, and the ideas, both really wrong on their own, kind of merge and fuse into a third crazy idea. Continue like that several times over and you get the "movement." Same reason sites like AboveTopSecret and Infowars read like such conspiracy theory alphabet soup.

I think "sovereign citizen" is the legal equivalent of the medical term "borderline personality", basically it boils down to the individual being an insufferable asshole who the world is suppose to accomodate.

A tape was shown of the incident, though Kiesche claimed it had been altered and that parts were missing. The officer said initially a camera was not working. He said under the new video setup that officers have no way to alter video, which is why they just turn it off and call it a malfunction.

clancifer:"...Kiesche, who was the speaker for a meeting of the Catoosa County Tea Party in 2011..."

That's just like the Liberal Media: Always lumping in the crazy with the stupid.

Yeah, but which one is which? They're awfully similar. The number of "Tea Party" people who gleefully misquote, ignore, or flat out don't know anything from the Constitution beyond the Second Amendment is about on par with the "Sovereign" loonies.

wait, you mean my rights don't come from almighty gawd? They are actually the result of a compact made between the occupants of the asylum? I've never had a clearer picture of America than that. Explains everything.

parasol:i hope for some witty officer to reply to this sort of thing "sovereign citizen? without diplomatic immunity, you must obey traffic laws and? where are your diplomatic plates? and where is your passport to enter THISsovereign nation?"

but i doubt any LEO wants to feed this sort of behavior

Like I mentioned earlier, that's when these nutballs start invoking their Constitutional rights for being "State Citizens" -- they don't need such documents, you see, because they can still claim all protections granted in the Constitution from the Articles up through the 13th Amendment.

Cake, eat, still have. As noted by others in this thread, it's 100% about wanting all the protections and benefits of society, but none of the responsibilities. So, they engage in magical thinking and "cargo-cult law" (a perfect description) to delude themselves into believing that they have gamed the system.

If one draws a venn diagram illustrating the relation of Tea Party Members, people who have no understanding of the U.S. constitution, and those with mental illness and/or developmental impairment, right in the nexus where the three sets overlap you will find the Sovereign Citizens.

So if they held a vote in Oregon and 80% of the people voted that they didn't feel the US gov't represents their interests anymore and would like to be removed from the union, you think that the US gov't should forcibily make them change their mind?

No, the US Government should make them petition the other 49 states to see if they agree with letting Oregon remove itself from the Union, as prescribed in Texas v. White. The only way a State can legally secede is with the permission or consent of the other 49.

Farce-Side:banandar123: tlchwi02: i got hit with a 75 dollar book in the neck once, and you bet it hurt. tiny little asian girl turned out had a heck of an arm on her

May I ask why a tiny asian girl threw a book at you?

It's not that weird, that's the same kind of kink I'm into as well.

So what's the real basis behind this sovereign citizen crap? Nobody's ever been able to really explain it to me.

The "leaders" of the movement make their living giving seminars on how to use twisted pseudo-legalese to supposedly discharge debts, not pay taxes and get away with ignoring pretty much any law they feel is inconvenient. It's basically a law themed series of magic incantations. By this means a handful of people exploit the stupidity and ignorance of poorly educated losers. The pseudo-legalese is sufficiently convoluted and bizarre so as to make people think they're getting some kind of secret knowledge, as opposed to the made up BS it really is.

MugzyBrown:I just don't agree with the idea that some guys signed a contract 250 years ago and everybody who happens to be born within imaginary lines are forever bound by that contract.

But that's the way it has always been. We are lucky to even have a contract. Most people throughout history were born into a kingdom or an empire and were subject to whatever the ruler wanted. Everyone in the history of civilization has been born into a 'system' of some kind or another, and they have the choice to either stay or leave.

These people are more than welcome to form their own country in the same way countries have always been formed. They can buy land from another country and then set up whatever, or they can invade and conquer land from another country, or they can discover new land and claim it. I'm sure with enough money some south pacific country would sell an island free and clear. Then they can defend their new country, set up an economy, and build diplomatic relationships just like it's been done for 10,000 years. It'll be like Civ 6: Reality Edition.

Why these people feel they are entitled to reap the benefits of living in an organized society without paying into the system or being held to its rules is beyond me.

sprgrss:geekbikerskum: sprgrss: Which is incredibly stupid because you would never fly a fringed flag on a ship because the fringe would be ripped off in a heartbeat.

Does anyone know what the gold fringe actually *means* and why it's there? Is there a historical context for it? Did it have some meaning in the past that's now vestigial? Unfortunately trying to search for this stuff on Google turns up nothing but pages with so much derp about Freemasons, sovereign citizens, and the non-validity of the Sixteenth Amendment that it makes my eyes bleed and my brain hurt.

"Gold fringe is used on the National flag as an honorable enrichment only. It is not regarded as an integral part of the flag and its use does not constitute an unauthorized addition to the design prescribed by statutes. "

The idea that it is a special millitary flag comes from this:'President, Dwight David Eisenhower, by Executive Order No.10834, signed on August 21, 1959 and printed in the Federal Register at 24 F.R. 6865, pursuant to law, stated that: "A military flag is a flag that resembles the regular flag of the United States, except that it has a yellow fringe border on three sides." '

Which in reality does not state that a flag with fringes makes the place a military installation, but that the military damn well better use a flag that looks cool. It does not prevent others from also using a cool looking flag.

geekbikerskum:sprgrss: Which is incredibly stupid because you would never fly a fringed flag on a ship because the fringe would be ripped off in a heartbeat.

Does anyone know what the gold fringe actually *means* and why it's there? Is there a historical context for it? Did it have some meaning in the past that's now vestigial? Unfortunately trying to search for this stuff on Google turns up nothing but pages with so much derp about Freemasons, sovereign citizens, and the non-validity of the Sixteenth Amendment that it makes my eyes bleed and my brain hurt.

From what I've read, it's just an aesthetic thing. Yellow is a nice contrasting color, and frames the flag nicely against any background. It's found on indoor-use flags.

>>The officer said the driver "challenged me with different codes and stuff at first."

Oh no, the driver probably has an obnoxious level of case law memorized for just this event. Well guess what, it's an officer's job to know the laws too.

Well... no, not really. It's an officer's job to know what the limits of his reasonable authority are in a given situation, not every philosophical nuance of the controlling opinion of the appellate court that established those limits back in 1903 with the landmark case of Joe v. Schmoe. It sounds like this guy rattled off a bunch of mumbo-jumbo to try to confuse the cop in question into forgetting that it's okay to pull someone over when you witness a traffic violation. Not surprisingly, it didn't work. The correct procedure in that case is to write the ticket and let the esteemed legal theorist explain to the traffic court judge why school zone speed limits don't apply to vehicles with an odd number of wheels.

m00:There are valid reasons to not immediately stop. Mostly due to criminals in fake police cars pulling over people on empty highways. But I think you are allowed to drive down the road to a well-lit area, or pull into a parkinglot, or something like that. Depends on the situation and the area. In some places, you are allowed to drive to the nearest police station if you really want to.

Sure, but in those cases you generally should -- as a courtesy to the officer -- indicate in some way that you acknowledge that he's requiring you to stop but that you're briefly proceeding to a safe area: put on a turn signal, slow down, or acknowledge the demand to stop in some other way. In some cases, particularly in lonely roads without anyone else around, you can call the police dispatch line, say that you're being signaled to stop by a police officer but you prefer to proceed to a well-lit area like a gas station, and they'll radio that to the officer. Simply continuing to drive on like normal is generally a bad idea.

MugzyBrown:Farce-Side: So what's the real basis behind this sovereign citizen crap? Nobody's ever been able to really explain it to me.

We are all born into a contract of rules we never have a chance to review and agree to.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them,

If the US Colonies could do it with the British, why can't NJ do it with the US, or Newark with NJ, or the whatever neighborhood with Newark, etc

The book "diamond age" by Neil Stephenson paints a fairly grim picture of what life might be like where the accident of your birth has little bearing on your sovereign affiliation. Worth a read.

Additionally, irrespective of a persons consent, they consume resources from the moment of their inception that are either the product of or preserved by the state. The consumption of those resources is tacit consent to abide by the terms of the social contract which enables those resources to exhist.In the special case of democratic revolution, the renunciation of the social contract between a people and its government must be carried out by a consensus of those people due to a commonly held belief that the government in question has already breached the terms of the contract.

So I guess what I'm saying is...you farking fail teabaggers! You had your shot and the black guy still got the most votes.

ongbok:He was lucky that he wasn't charged with failure to stop for the police. He probably got off on that charge because of the camera malfunction.

There are valid reasons to not immediately stop. Mostly due to criminals in fake police cars pulling over people on empty highways. But I think you are allowed to drive down the road to a well-lit area, or pull into a parkinglot, or something like that. Depends on the situation and the area. In some places, you are allowed to drive to the nearest police station if you really want to.

Famous Thamas:rufus-t-firefly: Did the courtroom have a FRINGED FLAG?!?!?

http://www.apfn.org/apfn/flag.htm

The flags displayed in State courts and courts of the United States have gold or yellow fringes. That is your WARNING that you are entering into a foreign enclave, the same as if you are stepping into a foreign embassy and you will be under the jurisdiction of that flag.The flag with the gold or yellow fringe has no constitution, no laws, and no rules of court, and is not recognized by any nation on the earth, and is foreign to you and the United States of America.

Woah, weapons grade derp there.

Oh, there's even better stuff out there.

For instance, some people claim that the American flag isn't REALLY the American flag - it's the military flag. The U.S. Civil Flag for Peacetime is our REAL flag.

Before 1940, no U.S. flag, civil or military, flew within the forty-eight states except in federal settings and installations. Only state flags did. Since the 1935 institution of Social Security and the Buck Act of 1940, 4 U.S.C.S. Ch. 4 Sec. 104-113, by clever legal maneuvers the feds have entirely circumvented the U.S. Constitution, and have overlaid federal territorial jurisdiction on the sovereign States, bringing them under the admiralty/military jurisdiction of Law Merchant, the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC), the law of Creditors and Debtors.

Since then the U.S. military flag appears beside, or in place of, the state flags in nearly all locations within the states. All of the state courts and even the municipal ones now openly display it. In the last half century they have more openly declared the military/admiralty law jurisdiction with the addition of the gold fringe to the flag, the military flag of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.

Such has been the path that has brought us under the Law of the Military Flag. This should have raised serious questions from many citizens long ago, but we've been educated to listen and believe what we are told, not to ask questions, or think for ourselves and search for the truth.

The flags displayed in State courts and courts of the United States have gold or yellow fringes. That is your WARNING that you are entering into a foreign enclave, the same as if you are stepping into a foreign embassy and you will be under the jurisdiction of that flag.The flag with the gold or yellow fringe has no constitution, no laws, and no rules of court, and is not recognized by any nation on the earth, and is foreign to you and the United States of America.

>>The officer said the driver "challenged me with different codes and stuff at first."

Oh no, the driver probably has an obnoxious level of case law memorized for just this event. Well guess what, it's an officer's job to know the laws too.

>>A tape was shown of the incident, though Kiesche claimed it had been altered and that parts were missing. The officer said initially a camera was not working. He said under the new video setup that officers have no way to alter video.

Okay, now this is BS. The camera "wasn't working properly" and parts of the stop were missing? Judge should throw out the case based on this alone.

Man On A Mission:And by "throw the book at" we mean he was fined $50 and ordered to pay court costs on charges of not having a driver's license or proof of insurance and $25 and court costs on a light law violation.

Though a $75 book could hurt when thrown, if it's one of those big coffee table books.

/ but I digress

If he's anything like all other Sovereign Citizens/Tea Partiers, he is unemployed, sucking on the gummint teat, and if he is younger than 40, living in his momma's basement. He likely won't have the money to pay the fines until he steals grandma's social security check.

He was fined $50 and ordered to pay court costs on charges of not having a driver's license or proof of insurance and $25 and court costs on a light law violation.

A $50 fine (plus possibly unlimited "court costs") is the maximum punishment by a city court judge in Tennessee. You have a right to a real trial if the fine is greater.

In my area he'd be offered a deal that would set him back a couple hundred dollars and keep the conviction off his record if he got a license. And he would defy the court and refuse to get a license, and the judge would be annoyed at him, and trouble would follow.